Anyone interested in a differential IR Z probe for deltas?

Getting back on topic - for info, I have just successfully used one of these IR sensors on blue painters' tape, for printing PLA onto a cold bed.

Thanks for the feedback! So far it seems that the only surface that the sensor really doesn't like is mirrored glass, because of the strong reflection from the back surface. For glass on top of aluminium, I recommend putting a thin sheet of black paper or black plastic between the two, even though I have used the sensor successfully without..

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Guys

Pics of My Mini Sensor mounted to my RoboDigg Alloy Kossel Effector along with E3D V6 Lite hotend (Same dimensions as a full E3D V6).





I have also attached the STL's for anyone who would like them and will post the Freecad files if requested (Can export them as openscad if required also)

Doug

I have had several enquiries about this board since the first batch ran out, so I have today ordered some more PCBs. I hope to have more completed boards available on or around 22 June. Please send me a PM if you would like more details or to pre-order one.

If you haven't already seen it, here is a video of the board being used to auto-calibrate my delta printer: [www.youtube.com]. The fitting instructions etc. are at [miscsolutions.wordpress.com].

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2015 11:31AM by dc42.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Dave

Off Topic but from your Blog re large kossel you say your rods are 315 mm long is that center to center of the joints or the length of the bare carbon tube?

I have 5 x 1 mtr lengths of 6x4 on it's way to me and I will re-do all my Rods to make sure they are dead on yet Again.

Doug

Quote
dougal1957
Off Topic but from your Blog re large kossel you say your rods are 315 mm long is that center to center of the joints or the length of the bare carbon tube?

That's the bare tube. Distance between bearing centres is 350mm.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Thanks Dave

just the info I needed.

In the video it seems to work well on glass...

Quote
sungod3k
In the video it seems to work well on glass...

It works well on most surfaces, except for glass with something that reflects strongly underneath it. So it won't work on mirror glass. In the video, you can see that the aluminium bed under the glass is painted matt black.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Ah ok, my bad

I have black paper under my glass bed - works very nicely. The paper also reduces the risk of cracking the glass when it's clamped down onto my aluminium heated bed (if the bed ever gets scratched, or there's grit on it).

I now have a good stock of these boards. I reduced the height a little so that the version 1.1 board fits below the heatsink of a E3Dv6 hot end, allowing it to be placed closer to the nozzle. If you wish to place an order, see [forums.reprap.org] for latest prices, and send me a PM giving your country and PayPal email address.

I designed a new E3Dv6 fan duct to mount it on:



You can find the files at [www.thingiverse.com].

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2015 03:04AM by dc42.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Dave

As I am not normally a Scad user can you post the Configuration.scad file and advise which parameters to change to alter the position of the effector mounting holes.

Looks like I will be needing a new board from you as well some time soon so I can use the design (Existing boards will prob get used on another printer)

Doug

Quote
dougal1957
Dave

As I am not normally a Scad user can you post the Configuration.scad file and advise which parameters to change to alter the position of the effector mounting holes.

Looks like I will be needing a new board from you as well some time soon so I can use the design (Existing boards will prob get used on another printer)

Doug

Oops, I didn't notice the dependency on configuration.scad. I've added it to the files on Thingyverse.

The effector mounting holes are defined by this part:

    // Main mounting holes
    for (a = [60:60:359]) {
      rotate([0, 0, a]) translate([0, 12.2, 0]) 
        cylinder(r=m3_radius+m3VertExtraRadius, h=12.2, center=true, $fn=12);
    }

I think you need to change the 12.2 in the translate call.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/09/2015 05:31AM by dc42.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Any of you in the USA who want one of these IR height sensors can now get them from Filastruder. See the announcement in the For Sale section for more.

They are compatible with most printer electronics including RAMPS and Duet.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Observation about the IR sensor sensitivity to bed surface.

A clear glass bed returns a height of 1.25mm, but when I put on blue painter's tape it jumps to 2.2.
I will have to keep editing the config file whenever I change filament type unless some way is added to automatically switch based on selected material. (multiple definitions or z offset)

Some change in trigger height is expected when making drastic changes to the bed surface, but that sounds higher than I would expect. Do you have a black surface under the glass?

As you are using Duet electronics, you can account for the difference by running the following before printing:

G31 Z2.2 ; set Z probe threshold
G32 ; auto calibrate

Or:

G31 Z2.2
G1 X0 Y0 Z5
G30 ; probe the bed centre

You can put theae commands in macro files called Prepare PLA and Prepare ABS. I use such files already to preheat the bed and nozzle to operating temperature. Or you could put them in your slicer start gcode.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Quote
dc42
I designed a new E3Dv6 fan duct to mount it on:

2015-07-24%2012.28.10.jpg

2015-07-24%2012.47.59.jpg

You can find the files at [www.thingiverse.com].

David,

I've built one of these, and fitted my new IR sensor to it - all looks very good, and it's auto-calibrating nicely. I also like the idea of using a 40mm fan, as I've had reliability problems with the 30mm ones (even the one supplied by E3D).

My only concern is the distance from the hot-end aluminium block to the back of the board - I've put a couple of layers of kapton tape on the back of the board as you recommend, but I'm not sure how long it's going to stay there. I have a sheet of thin cork - I was wondering if one or two layers of that between the ali block and the kapton tape would help to keep the heat off the components (or would it make it worse?).

Cheers,
David

Yes, a layer of cork would be a good idea provided there is still an air gap. Perhaps glue the cork to the back of the board instead of using Kapton tape, leaving access to the screws, and glue aluminium foil on top of the cork to relect the heat radiated across the air gap.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Hmm... I thought I had some cork - seems that I don't...

I might try to find something different. I tried to insert some exhaust manifold wrap (when used on cars, over 600C on the inside, touchable by hand outside) but it was too loosely woven and fell apart. Anyone in the UK know a source for aerogel?

you can get 600C RTV silicone cheaply that seems to work quite well. I use it to insulate the heater block on my J-Head and it works just fine.

Aerogel might be a bit exotic for diy printers ;-)

Well this place seems to ship worldwide:

[www.buyaerogel.com]

Anyway, on to my actual question:

Does anyone know offhand what needs tweaking on the E3D V6 fan shroud above to make it fit an E3D V5?

I dropped an email to E3D a few weeks back asking the same but have had no reply beyond the standard "we've opened a ticket for you, BRB" so I thought I'd try the hive mind here

Cheers,
Robin.

Hi David,

Regarding your fan duct - I think it may be giving me some problems. I ended up with a filament blockage in the hot end that went right back to the top of the heatbreak, and I think it was due to the low volume of air passing over the cooling fins. This was with a VERY substantial 40mm fan that was blowing a fair gale when not fitted to the mount - when it was mounted I was getting a fair bit of blow-back off the front of the fan (the intake side) as though it simply couldn't get enough air through the mount to the fins. This fan was 20mm thick - I also tried a 10mm thick fan but with that one I could barely detect the airflow at the exit of the cooling fins. If you compare your fan duct with the original one you can see that the E3D one has a far bigger hole through the middle. Experiments are continuing, but I may try the original E3D fan with a separate fan to see how it works out.

Caveat: I have had all sorts of jamming problems in the past with this hotend, so it may be another issue - my Prusa i3 uses 3mm filament with a direct extruder, and I much prefer that setup! At the moment I'm not a great fan of 1.75mm filament through a bowden tube... but that may just be my personal prejudice...

Hi David, thanks for your feedback.

I've just compared my fan duct design with the E3D 30mm fan duct, and the size of the hole through the middle looks about the same to me. I am using a 10mm fan and there is a reasonable flow of air from the back of the heatsink, but some backwash from the front too. I've not compared it with the original 30mm E3D fan and duct.

On my Ormerod I use a printed fan inlet plate to eliminate the backwash, and I may try the same on the delta too.

The real test is whether the heatsink gets too warm when the head is at operating temperatures, which is something you can easily test. Just heat up the hot end and feel the back of the heatsink. Be careful not to touch the heater block. With my hot end at 200C, the fins at the back are not even warm. The only time I get a hot end jam is when I retract too much, but this is something that E3D warns against.

If you want to use the original E3D 30mm fan and duct, you could perhaps adapt this design [www.thingiverse.com].

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/31/2015 05:43PM by dc42.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Quote
dc42
If you want to use the original E3D 30mm fan and duct, you could perhaps adapt this design [www.thingiverse.com].

My original fan is too wobbly for that! It gets quite loose once you've taken it off the heatsink and replaced it a few times... not to worry - I've got a design that I will try out shortly and I'll publish it if it works. It won't be as close as yours though, unfortunately.

Hmm...

David, I think I owe you an apology!

I reverted to my old design, using the original E3D fan and shroud... and the filament is still jamming.

It looks like I have an issue with the hot-end itself. Investigations continue (and I'll stop clogging up this thread).

Cheers,
David

Quote
David J
Hmm...

David, I think I owe you an apology!

I reverted to my old design, using the original E3D fan and shroud... and the filament is still jamming.

It looks like I have an issue with the hot-end itself. Investigations continue (and I'll stop clogging up this thread).

Cheers,
David

Thanks!

The only time I get jamming in my genuine all-metal E3Dv6 is when I try to retract too much filament, or I try to retract all the filament with the head at full operating temperature. Then I have to remove the Bowden tube from the hot end (fortunately very easy on the V6, by pressing down on the collet), and I find there is a bulge in the filament just below the bottom of the tube. I feed a little filament through, cut off the bulge, and it's cleared.

I did get a jamming problem on a J-head (genuine AFAIK) hot end that I never got to the bottom of. The problem started when one of the teeth of a pneumatic connector detached and made its way into the hot end. I removed it with tweezers, but after that the hot end kept jamming.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Mine is also a genuine E3Dv6 - I'm having a number of issues, by the look of it:

The filament isn't getting from the bowden tube into the narrow part of the threaded heat-break. I tested this using a short length of bowden tube and the cooling body with just the heat-break screwed in - even if I do get it through, it's a bit 'scratchy' - the filament end is neat and tidy (freshly cut piece). I plan to check the hole for burrs shortly.

The hot-end behaves as though it's too cool - it seems to clog easily, and getting the filament back out is sometimes impossible (not due to a lump on the end of the filament - it's really stuck in there). However, I have checked the temperature using a thermocouple probe on my multimeter, and compared the value against the E3Dv6 hot-end on my Prusa, using the same technique; I get pretty much the same temperature on both.

The first problem is just a mechanical issue, but the second is more of a mystery.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/01/2015 01:18PM by David J.

Have you made any more of these?

I have the 1.0 version of this already but I just bought a E3D v6 genuine and I don't think the earlier version will work with that and your fanshroud.

So I'm interested in a new one!

Got some issues with the one I have as well.

I haven't used the one I have yet, but I thought I'd connect it and see if I could get it to calibrate better with it than what I can "manually"

But I cannot get it to trigger against the glass....
I painted the glass black on the opposite side thinking that might make it better but no.

I have it wired to the duet, it flashes four times when starting up, but it doesn't trigger when going down.
If I put a piece of white paper on the glass I get it to trigger at ~Z=1.50, but if I remove the paper it doesn't trigger at all and the reading in the web-interface doesn't change either, the sensor reading stays at 0 all the way down until the nozzle touches the bed at Z=-0.1.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/2015 01:41AM by Koenig.